Ozark Folkways is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to the preservation, instruction, and development of regional heritage, arts, crafts and music.

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Monday, October 24, 2011

Your Heart Would Ache Could You Be Here . . .

“Teresa
dear, your heart would ache could you be here and see these mothers coming for
clothing for their little ones.
There is so much need for them to help themselves . . .”

The
rugged terrain that families of the Ozarks had to travel on a daily basis
likely increased the level of poverty in the Boston Mountains during the first
half of the twentieth century. Even when a year-round job could be had in Fort
Smith, Van Buren or on the other side of the mountain in Fayetteville, it was
always a struggle to get to the jobsite or the factory in the middle of winter.
In those days, just to get a truck out of the holler, to climb up steep snow
packed roads without sliding down into a canyon, was a major undertaking. Ice
or snow could shut everything down for weeks, and not many steady employers
could tolerate such prolonged absences from the job.

This
was the world Clara Muxen drove into that foggy day so many decades ago; the
world she became a part of when she settled in the Boston Mountains, and, it
appears from her letters, the reason she became intent on building the Craft
School of the Ozarks.

Teresa
. . .” something should be done to teach these people a way of making a living.
May God grant that the school will help them to learn a skill that will be
profitable to them.”

Clara
Margaret Muxen was 58 years old when she arrived in the Ozarks. A retired
educator, she sought to lift the local people out of poverty. Being a devoutly religious woman, she
also worried over their spiritual well being.

Miss
Muxen not only founded the Craft School of The Ozarks, in the ensuing twenty-one
years following her fateful arrival, this single woman founded Our Lady of the
Ozarks, Virgin of the Smile Shrine, located next door to the craft school, a
shrine Danny Thomas has paid homage to, as well as the Winslow Thrift Store; an
amazing legacy for one woman.

It
is not often we encounter someone who has the faith and fortitude to make such
a tremendous physical difference in the local community as Miss Muxen did.

She
was so taken with empathy for the area’s poor, that she would dedicate the remainder
of her life and all her material wealth and well being, to address the needs of
the families of the Boston Mountains.

The
Craft School of the Ozarks was to be her ultimate gift to the community; the
jewel on the mountain that would shine so brightly and lead those in poverty to
a more sustainable, even profitable, life style.

So
with pencil and paper in hand, a gift from her brother and the support of
numerous friends from across the country, Clara Muxen began to set in motion a
dream that had once been only in her head.

A
dream that would inevitably come so close to her heart’s desire, so close to
her vision, so close . . . that it is painful to look into her future.

But
Miss Muxen knew none of that then, all she knew was the soreness of her muscles
from pouring cement, the sweat on her cheek from the midday sun, and all she
heard, as she leaned back to rest, was a symphony ringing out over the hills of
the Ozarks, of hammer hitting nail, and nails hitting good solid wood.